


Sleeping in the Light

by icarus_chained



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Dreams, Gen, Mind Control, Mind Games
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-06-17
Updated: 2012-06-17
Packaged: 2017-11-07 23:17:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/436520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was an alien sky, above him. That happened, when Tony dreamed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleeping in the Light

**Author's Note:**

> _Why_? Why does my brain do this to me? Does it not know that I already have three stories on the go as it is? Why does it insist on starting a fourth one? *grumbles furiously at self*
> 
> Also, tags and pairings may change over this one. I'm not completely sure where it's going, yet. *growls at brain*

There was an alien sky, above him.

That happened, sometimes. Tony knew that, knew why. Even since Manhattan, ever since the invasion, there were times … when he dreamed of alien skies.

Usually, though, he was falling through them. And usually, he wasn’t _aware_ he was dreaming. That was … more than a little weird.

“So, mortal,” said a voice behind him. Soft, amused. Laughing as Tony spun, yelping, to face … Fuck. Of course. Who the fuck else?

“Do they think me mad, mortal?” Loki asked, with that tiny smirk of his, as he moved to Tony’s side. Ignoring how Tony shied back instantly. Just standing there, next to him, on the … the edge? The edge of a bridge, vast, crystalline, alien, expansive. Nothing Tony knew. Fuck. Shit and fuck. “What was the phrase? Crazy as a bag of cats?”

Tony blinked at him. Stood, and stared, and blinked at him, ignoring the question, while his mind flipped into overdrive. Scan the environment, run the numbers. Factor the enemies. Come to a conclusion.

“This is a dream,” he said, flatly. Testingly. Accusingly. “I’m dreaming.”

Loki flashed a smile. He looked like hell, Tony noted absently. Shadowed eyes, face worn down to bones. If Tony was dreaming, Loki looked like he hadn’t slept, in possibly the last _year_.

“Dreaming, yes,” the demi-god murmured, one pale hand reaching up to gesture, vaguely. Encompassing ... everything, and nothing at all. “In theory, not so, but kidnapping you and transporting you physically to this spot would be … rather difficult for me, at the moment.” He smiled, and it would have looked about right on a shark. “I am lacking certain necessities, as it were.”

Tony’s lip curled up in a sneer. He wasn’t completely sure he’d meant it to. “Performance issues?” he asked, lightly, because fuck it, he was standing alone, under alien skies, on a space bridge, with the god of fucking lies. Alone, and vulnerable, and with no clue what was going on. Was there a better time, to be rubbing your captor’s nose in his deficiencies? Was there honestly any better moment, to go tempting fate?

Loki looked at him. Saying nothing, for a long, long moment, and Tony braced himself, held himself ready, because he did remember how unstable the guy was, thanks, he did remember what the flash of fury felt like, grounded through very human flesh. 

But Loki, after a second, smiled instead. Loki, eyes dark and glittering on Tony’s, didn’t lash out. He smiled, low and dark and secret, a tiny, knowing curve of his lips, and his eyes were almost … appreciative.

“Interesting that you should mention that,” he mused, lightly, turning now to face Tony fully. Balanced precariously on the edge of nothingness, light on his feet, orientated against infinity by Tony himself. That … niggled something, for Tony. That worried at something, at the back of his mind. “I wonder, mortal. Do you remember the circumstances, when last you said those words?”

Tony blinked. Bounced on the balls of his feet, a little, shifting and ready. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he remembered, and … Understood, too. What Loki was implying. What Loki was saying.

An explanation. Or close enough to count. From _Loki_. Huh. Who’d’a thunk?

“It won’t work, you know,” he said, quietly. Watching the lift of one querying eyebrow, watching the smug curve of those lips. “After Clint, you think I walked in there without planning for that? You think I went anywhere _near_ you, without being ready for that?” He grinned, hard and fierce, and shook his head. “You won’t get them through me. Not any of them.”

Loki raised an eyebrow. “You had a plan to encompass mind-control?” he asked, sneering, incredulous. “Because, really, I don’t think it worked.” Gesturing around them, down at himself, smiling that faint, fucking _annoying_ , smirk.

Tony ratcheted his own grin up a notch, in response. Tempting fate, tempting fate, shit, he was _Tony Stark_. Tempting fate was his _job_. He canted himself forward, leaned in to grin right in the man’s face. 

“No, no, you’re right,” he said, shrugging self-depreciatingly. “There’s only so much I can do, without a proper understanding of the technology involved, I’ll grant you that. I couldn’t actually _stop_ you, if you wanted to crawl inside my head.” He cast his own look around, grinning faintly. “Obviously.”

Loki tilted his head, then. Interested, now, real genuine interest, and weirdly unthreatening about it. He stepped forward, moving into Tony, into his reach, on the precipice. Tony, very carefully, did not grin. 

“And yet, you seem so confident,” Loki murmured. Hummed, almost. Watching Tony’s eyes, watching for the little grin Tony was almost positive he wasn’t actually showing. “Yet, you seem so sure” He smiled, soft and amused. “Why is that, do you think?”

Tony grinned. Let himself. Fuck it, looked like the man already knew it was there. Might as well. He grinned, and shrugged.

“I’m a hackable device,” he said, quietly. “Without knowing how you got in, how you get out, there’s nothing I can do about that. So. You get me. Soon as I walked in there, you had me. But that … that’s _all_ you get. Even if it had worked the first time. That was all you were getting. You never had the option for more.”

Loki’s brows rose. “ _Really_ ,” he said, and it was amused, fuck him, it was still laughing faintly. “And how did you manage _that_?”

Tony smiled, faintly. Reached out, slowly, making sure Loki knew what was happening at every moment. No sudden shocks. Not just yet. He reached up, and touched the man’s shoulder gently. Just to make a point. “Because,” he said, smiling softly. “I’ve got someone you can’t touch. And he knows when to shut me down, and why. You can have me. You can do what you want to me. But you can’t _use_ me. Not without going through him.”

Loki tilted his head. Looking down at Tony’s fingertips, where they touched his armour. Smiling faintly in bemusement. “Jarvis?” he asked, lightly. “The Jarvis you were berating, while I threatened you?”

And that was worrying, that was a flash of fear through Tony’s gut, but his grin didn’t falter. Nope, nada. “I don’t know how you got in here,” he mused, poking absently. “I’ll figure it out, mind, don’t worry there. But it doesn’t matter. Crawl around all you want. Take whatever you feel like. Smash whatever takes your fancy.” He looked up, looked the god full in the face, grinning into that exhausted, strangely hungry stare. “You won’t get past us. You won’t get to touch them. And, sooner or later …”

He paused, smirked, and Loki leaned in. Laughing, hungry, leaning against the touch of Tony’s hand, leaning into his grin. “Sooner or later?” the god asked, and Tony’s stomach flip-flopped, at the raw interest, there, at the raw hunger.

“Sooner or later,” he said, hoarse all of a sudden, fear and anticipation a tight, heavy ball in his gut. Smiling, faintly, as he shifted his grip from light to seizing, clutching hold of Loki’s shoulder as the god merely looked at him, and grinned. “The longer you’re in _my_ head. Sooner or later, _I’m going to catch up to you_.”

Loki could have stopped him. All Loki’s strength, all Loki’s power, all the rules Loki knew and he didn’t. Loki could have stopped him. But for some reason, as Tony’s push propelled him over the edge, as Tony flung him, savagely, out past the precipice and into the abyss, Loki didn’t struggle. Loki didn’t move. 

Loki fell, let himself fall. Tumbled away through alien stars like Tony did, night after night. Loki laughed as Tony seized him, flung wide his hands as Tony threw him. Loki, grinning, mad and exhausted and hungry, allowed himself to fall.

And as he did, as he grew distant … he smiled at Tony. Grinned, in distant, unknowable starlight.

“Will you now?” he whispered, to Tony as he crouched trembling on the bridge behind him. “Will you, Stark?”

And though his body was as far away as stars, his voice, chill and laughing, was still pressed to Tony’s ear.


End file.
